


The ultimate spell

by Evietan



Category: Love Live! School Idol Project
Genre: Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, F/F, Getting Together
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-20
Updated: 2017-09-20
Packaged: 2018-12-31 23:02:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12143019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evietan/pseuds/Evietan
Summary: Maki grows up mostly alone, studying witchcraft, but secretly, she's been wanting to go to school for a while now, to experience life as everyone else does, and maybe even make a friend or two.Needless to say, she's not prepared for anything that happens.





	The ultimate spell

**Author's Note:**

> Had this idea forever and finally started seriously writing it. I've been deep in idol hell for a while now it's time I wrote something for it.

Magic wasn’t something just everyone could learn. It was an art, or a science, depending on who you asked, but it wasn’t for the masses. It was passed down for generations, in a few chosen families, and it came with the duty to use it for the community to the best of your abilities.

Being born into one of those families, Maki had always taken her magical studies extremely serious. Even if complicated spells and endless lists of potions and their ingredients could get terribly boring and tiring at times, she powered through, her parents’ sermons about responsibility and society always on the back of her mind.

Honestly, it wasn’t so bad. She loved magic. People called it a gift, and she agreed. Magic made your life easier, it did small chores for you, provided you with a well-paying job and social prestige.

The one thing it didn’t do for you was making friends. Maki spent almost all her time at home, shut into the library to study. School was for normal children who had to learn normal things for normal jobs, not for her. It didn’t seem too bad most of the time, but as she got older, Maki found herself able to concentrate less and less, her gaze always drifting to the window where she could see students from the nearby high school pass. Chatting, eating snacks, running late, playfully shoving each other, listening to music and showing each other things on their phones.

It was terribly mundane and incredibly repetitive, but she couldn’t stop looking, wondering how it would be to join them.

Long story short, after an incredible amount of contemplating and then even more hours spent persuading her parents, Maki enrolled into Otonokizaka High School the following spring. It hadn’t been easy, but eventually her parents had caved in when she’d argued that she needed to know the people she was trying to help, both to understand them better and to not lose her sense of purpose. It was just three years anyway, she was ahead of schedule compared to other young witches and wizards her age, and she would still continue her education after school in the afternoon.

Her heart was beating like crazy from anxiety and excitement during the entire entrance ceremony, but she did her best to keep her face impassive so she wouldn’t come off as too weird. If her classmates singled her out as odd this early on it would render the entire thing useless.

Sadly, being this impassive had the negative side effect that people saw her as cold and unapproachable, and the ‘making friends’ part of her plan didn’t really make any progress on the first day. None, to be exact. Aside from her introduction in class, where she left out the tiny detail that she was a witch and might have come off as kind of boring as a result, she didn’t talk to anyone.

How were you even supposed to initiate a normal conversation? Why did it seem like everyone else already had friends? She couldn’t just inject herself into one of those groups, right? She’d just be the odd one out.

After a week of absolutely nothing, Maki was ready to give up. The only thing that kept her from not going anymore were the expecting glances of her parents, who had warned her and told her over and over she might not fit in with the normal people, and she didn’t want to prove them right.

In the second week, Maki had class duty, which meant she was given a broom and told to clean up other people’s trash. How annoying. She’d learned early how to clean her room using magic, and she hadn’t touched traditional cleaning utensils since.

But there was another girl on duty with her who was busy cleaning the desks, so Maki couldn’t use her magic or everyone would know, and whatever chance she had left to ever fit in would be gone.

“Um, e-excuse me, Nishikino-san,” the other girl spoke up after about five minutes of awkward silence, “aren’t you doing this the wrong way? You’re supposed to sweep everything into one pile, not just brush it to the side…”

Maki’s face flushed red. She’d just done what she’d seen people do in movies, but apparently, they weren’t a reliable source.

“S-Sorry,” she mumbled, “I’ve never done this before…” As quickly as she could, she rectified her mistake, but the other girl still finished way before her.

“Oh, you made significant process now! You’re a really fast learner,” the girl complimented her, “here, I’ll help you and then we can take the trash out together so we’ll be finished faster!” Maki looked up at her in surprise, but her face must have looked scary or something, because the girl immediately recoiled. “I-I’m sorry if I’m just assuming things! If you want to be alone, I can just leave! I’m annoying you, aren’t I?”

“NO! I mean, no, you’re not annoying me. In fact, your help is very much appreciated. You seem like good company.”

That made the girl giggle. “Fine, I’ll help you then. My name is Koizumi Hanayo by the way. I don’t talk much, so you probably don’t remember, ahaha…”

Maki smiled. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Koizumi-san. I hope we get along well.”

“Oh no, no need to be so formal!” Hanayo frantically waved her hands. “Just Hanayo is fine.”

First name basis so early? In Maki’s social circle, this would be either considered incredibly rude or hitting on someone, but she couldn’t really imagine Hanayo doing either of these, so maybe this was just normal between high school girls? Between casual friends at least? Was that what Hanayo was trying to become? Maki decided she’d take the chance, now that it was finally right in front of her. “Only if you call me Maki.”

“Of course, Maki-chan!”

They had to part after their duties were done, because Maki had to go home to study, while Hanayo stayed behind to wait for a friend of hers in the track and field club. Maki was a little disappointed that she didn’t get to walk home with a friend like she’d dreamed of when she’d looked out of her window at the students all day, but it did little to suppress the giddy feeling in her chest. Finally, she was on the right track to make a friend!

The next morning, Hanayo greeted her, and Maki greeted back, but before Maki could figure out what topic normal girls could feasibly talk about, an orange head popped out behind Hanayo. “Kayo-chin, who’s that?”

“Ah, it’s Maki. I told you about her, didn’t I?”

“Ohhh, you’re the one who didn’t know how to clean!”

“Rin-chan!” Hanayo hissed. “Um, Maki-chan, this is Rin, the friend I told you about. Rin-chan, please don’t be rude, she learned fast and cleaned without complaining. Don’t you remember, she said she was being home-schooled until now during her introduction, of course she wouldn’t know how to clean a classroom.”

“I didn’t mean it in a bad way! That was just what I remembered. You’re not offended, right, Maki-chan? If you are, I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Maki assured her, “I guess it’s pretty weird that I can’t do normal stuff like that…”

The bell rang after that, but Hanayo and Rin invited her to join them for lunch, and they became fast friends after that. It barely even mattered that Hanayo and Rin had known each other forever, they just accepted Maki into their friendship without any trouble. On a rainy day where Rin’s club was cancelled, they even walked home together, and even though the others teased her a bit about it, Maki was incredibly happy about it. She finally had what she’d wanted for so long.

Of course, it could only last for a short amount of time. Someone in their class, Maki could never pinpoint who exactly, apparently did some research about local magician families, and of course Maki’s name came up along with her parents’. The rumours reached Hanayo and Rin in no time, and of course they demanded to know the truth, and why she’d hidden it.

Maki had no choice but to confess. Not just about being a witch, but also about why she’d come to this school. She was sure her friends would turn away, knowing she was so different and so pathetic, but they just accepted it.

“So you can really use magic? Do something then! Can you make me be able to talk to cats? I always wanted to be able to do that!”

“Rin-chan, I heard magic is very complicated, she probably couldn’t do something like that on the spot…”

She really couldn’t. At all. But maybe she could look up sometime if it was possible and learn how to do it. Still, she concentrated, murmured a short spell, and cleaned Rin’s messy deck without even lifting a finger, and that was enough to bring stars into Rin’s eyes. “So cool!”

And that was that. Maki really didn’t care about what everyone else thought.

Or, well, that should have been it, because there was absolutely no way Maki could have foreseen or prepared herself for what happened next.

Just two days after Rin and Hanayo talked to her about being a witch, Maki was stopped in the hallway after school, with a grab to her arm and a loud “Hey!”.

“What,” she answered, not willing to be polite if the other person wasn’t. When she turned around, she found herself face to face with a girl that looked younger than Maki herself, but was actually two years older, according to the ribbon around her neck. Maybe it was just the lack of height and the kind of childish pigtails that made her seem so young.

“I heard you’re a witch. If that’s true, you have to join my club, where all the witches of this school meet up and talk about magic and stuff. Since I’m your senpai, I’m sure I can teach you a thing or two!”

There were other witches at this school? And this girl claimed to be one of them? But if she lived around here, why had Maki never seen her before? Very fishy. “Introduce yourself first, maybe I’ll consider it.”

The girl didn’t seem too happy about that answer, but she huffed out “Fine” as she pulled Maki along, to a room where, indeed, a sign reading ‘Magic & Witchcraft Clubroom’ was hung on the door.

Once they were inside, the girl proudly turned around. “I am Yazawa Nico, the adorable president of this club and in charge of all the important stuff! If you have any questions, you can always ask me.”

“Okay, I have a few questions,” Maki started, not impressed at all, “if you’re really a witch, why have I never heard of you and your family’s name? What’s your specialty? Can you prove you’re a witch? And do you even have any other members? In case you didn’t know, studying magic is difficult and time-consuming, and thus I don’t actually have time to play around with someone who thinks this is just a game of pretend.”

“I can do magic!” Nico insisted, and Maki raised her eyebrows in response.

“Show me, then.”

Nico breathed in deeply, and Maki thought she might actually know what she was doing, until she opened her mouth. “Nico Nico Nii~ The ultimate spell of happiness will bring a smile to your face in an instant!”

It did the opposite. “This is ridiculous. I’m going home,” Maki announced and turned around, ready to make good on her promise.

“Stop!” Nico yelled and stomped her foot on the ground. The door slammed shut right in front of Maki’s face, clearly without having been touched at all.

Was that… Nico? Without a spell? While Maki knew it was technically possible to do any kind of magic completely without spells, it made the process much more difficult, and you were much more likely to get a result you didn’t want. It was dangerous, that’s why Maki had never even tried it. She could probably do it, at least for something as simple as shutting the door, but she’d have to concentrate very hard and it would take all of her courage to even try. To have such ability thrown into her face casually from someone who clearly didn’t know the first thing about magic was… baffling, to say the least.

Maki didn’t like the smug look on Nico’s face when she turned back around, but she couldn’t help her curiosity. She had to figure out what was going on, and if that meant she had to join this weird club, then so be it.

**Author's Note:**

> Come talk to me at my tumblr evvazi if you're looking for someone to scream about idols with.


End file.
